soreasonable in itself, and so absolutely necessary for the vindication of the honour of God, the nature of things, and the constitution and order of God's creation, was originally such, that the observance of the eternal rules of justice, equity, and goodness, does indeed of itself tend by direct and natural consequence to make all creatures happy, and the contrary practice to make them miserable; yet since, through some great and general corruption and depravation, (whencesoever that may have arisen,) the condition of men in this present state is such, that the natural order of things in this world is an event manifestly perverted, and virtue and goodness are visibly prevented in great measure from obtaining their proper and due effects in establishing men's happiness, proportionable to their behaviour and practice; therefore, it is absolutely impossible that the whole view and intention, the original and the final design, of God's creating such rational beings as men are, and placing them on this globe of earth, as the chief and principal, or indeed (to speak more properly) the only inhabitants, for whose sake alone this part at least of the creation is manifestly fitted up and accommodated; it is absolutely impossible (I say) that the whole of God's design in all this should be nothing more than to keep up eternally a succession of such short-lived generations of men as we at present are, and those in such a corrupt, confused, and disorderly state of things, as we see the world is now in; without any due observation of the eternal rules of good and evil; without any clear and remarkable effect of the great and most necessary difference of things; and without any final vindication of the honour and laws of God, in the proportionable reward of the best, or punishment of the worst of men. And, consequently, it is certain and necessary (even as certain as the moral attributes of God before demonstrated,) that instead of continuing an eternal succession of new generations in the present form and state of things, there must at some time or other be such a revolution and renovation of things, such a future state of existence of the same persons, as that, by an exact distribution of rewards and punishments therein, all the present disorders and inequalities may be set right, and that the whole scheme of providence, which, to us who judge of it by only one small portion of it, seems now so inexplicable and confused, may appear, at its consummation, to be a design worthy of infinite wisdom, justice, and goodness.

1. That, according to the original constitution of things, virtue and vice are attended with natural rewards and punishments. In order to establish a just and suitable difference between the respective fruits or effects of virtue and vice, the nature of things, and the constitution and order of God's creation, was originally such that the observance of the eternal rules of piety, justice, equity, goodness, and temperance, does of itself plainly tend, by direct and natural consequence, to make all creatures happy, and the contrary practice to make them miserable. This is evident in general; because the practice of universal virtue is (in imitation of the divine goodness) the practice of that which is best in the whole; and that which tends to the benefit of the whole, must, of necessary consequence, originally, and in its own nature, tend also to the benefit of every individual part of the creation. More particularly; a frequent and habitual contemplating the infinitely excellent perfections of the almighty creator and all-wise governor of the world, and our most bountiful benefactor; so as to excite in our minds a suitable adoration, love, and imitation of those perfections; a regular employing all our powers and faculties, in such designs and to such purposes only, as they were originally fitted and intended for by nature; and a due subjecting all our appetites and passions to the government of sober and modest reason; are evidently the directest means to obtain such settled peace and solid satisfaction of mind, as the first foundation, and the principal and most necessary ingredient of all true happiness. The temperate and moderate enjoyment of all the good things of this present world, and of the pleasures of life, according to the measures of right reason and simple nature, is plainly and confessedly the certainest and most direct method to preserve the health and strength of the body. And the practice of universal justice, equity, and benevolence, is manifestly (as has been before observed) as direct and adequate a means to promote the general welfare and happiness of men in society, as any physical motion, or geometrical operation, is to produce its natural effect. So that if all men were truly virtuous, and practised these rules in such manner that the miseries and calamities arising usually from the numberless follies and vices of men were prevented, undoubtedly this great truth would evidence itself visibly in fact, and appear experimentally in the happy state and condition of the world. On the contrary; neglect of God, and insensibleness of our relation and duty towards him; abuse and unnatural misapplication of the powers and faculties of our minds; inordinate appetites, and unbridled and furious passions, -- necessarily fill the mind with confusion, trouble, and vexation. And intemperance naturally brings weakness, pains, and sicknesses into the body. And mutual injustice and iniquity; fraud, violence, and oppression; wars, and desolation; murders, rapine, and all kinds of cruelty, -- are sufficiently plain causes of the miseries and calamities of men in society. So that the original constitution, order, and tendency of things, is evidently enough fitted and designed to establish naturally a just and suitable difference in general between virtue and vice, by their respective fruits or effects.

2. But that now in this present world, the natural order of things is so perverted that vice often flourishes in great prosperity, and virtue falls under the greatest calamities of life. But though originally the constitution and order of God's creation was indeed such, that virtue and vice are, by the regular tendency of things, followed with natural rewards and punishments; yet, in event, through some great and general corruption and depravation, (whencesoever that may have arisen, of which more hereafter;) the condition of men in the present state is plainly such, that this natural order of things in the world is manifestly perverted. Virtue and goodness are visibly prevented in great measure from obtaining their proper and due effect, in establishing men's happiness proportionable to their behaviour and practice; and wickedness and vice very frequently escape the punishment which the general nature and disposition of things tends to annex unto it. Wicked men, by stupidity, inconsiderateness, and sensual pleasure, often make shift to silence the reproaches of conscience, and feel very little of that confusion and remorse of mind which ought naturally to be consequent upon their vicious practices. By accidental strength and robustness of constitution, they frequently escape the natural ill consequences of intemperance and debauchery; and enjoy the same proportion of health and vigour as those who live up to the rules of strict and unblameable sobriety. And injustice and iniquity, fraud, violence, and cruelty, though they are always attended indeed with sufficiently calamitous consequences in the general; yet the most of those ill consequences fall not always upon such persons in particular as have the greatest share in the guilt of the crimes, but very commonly on those that have the least. On the contrary; virtue and piety, temperance and sobriety, faithfulness, honesty and charity; though they have indeed both in themselves the true springs of happiness, and also the greatest probabilities of outward causes to concur in promoting their temporal prosperity; though they cannot indeed be prevented from affording a man the highest peace and satisfaction of spirit, and many other advantages both of body and mind in respect of his own particular person; yet in respect of those advantages which the mutual practice of social virtues ought to produce in common, it is in experience found true, that the vices of a great part of mankind do so far prevail against nature and reason, as frequently to oppress the virtue of the best; and not only hinder them from enjoying those public benefits, which would naturally and regularly be the consequences of their virtue; but oft-times bring upon them the greatest temporal calamities, even for the sake of that very virtue. For it is but too well known that good men are very often afflicted and impoverished, and made a prey to the covetousness and ambition of the wicked; and sometimes most cruelly and maliciously persecuted, even upon account of their goodness itself. In all which affairs the providence of God seems not very evidently to interpose for the protection of the righteous. And not only so, but even in judgments also, which seem more immediately to be inflicted by the hand of heaven, it frequently suffers the righteous to be involved in the same calamities with the wicked, as they are mixed together in business and the affairs of the world.

3. That therefore there must needs be a future state of rewards and punishments.Which things being so; (viz. that there is plainly in event no sufficient distinction made between virtue and vice; no proportionable and certain reward annexed to the one, nor punshment to the other, in this present world:) And yet it being no less undeniably certain in the general, as has been before shown, that if there be a God, (and that God be himself a being of infinite justice and goodness; and it be his will, that all rational creatures should imitate his moral perfections; and he [230] cannot but see and take notice how every creature behaves itself; and cannot but be accordingly pleased with such as obey his will and imitate his nature, and be displeased with such as act contrary thereto;) it being certain, I say, that if these things be so, God must needs, in vindication of the honour of his laws and government, signify at some time or other this his approbation or displeasure, by making finally a suitable difference between those who obey him, and those who obey him not; it follows unavoidably, either that all these notions which we frame concerning God, are false; and that there is no providence, and God sees not, or at least has no regard to what is done by his creatures, and consequently the ground of all his own moral attributes is taken away, and even his being itself; or else that there must necessarily be a future state of rewards and punishments after this life, wherein all the present difficulties of providence shall be cleared up, by an exact and impartial administration of justice. But now, that these notions are true, that there is a God, and a providence, and that God is himself a being induced with all moral perfections, and expects and commands that all his rational creatures should govern all their actions by the same rules, has been particularly and distinctly proved already. It is therefore directly demonstrated, that there must be a future state of rewards and punishments. Let not thine heart envy sinners, but be thou in the fear of the Lord all the day long, for surely there is a reward, and thine expectation shall not be cut off. -- Prov.xxiii.17 and 18.

4. Of the Stoical opinion concerning the self-sufficiency of virtue to its own happiness. This argument is indeed a common one, but it is nevertheless strongly conclusive and unanswerable; so that, whoever denies a future state of rewards and punishments, must, of necessity, by a chain of unavoidable consequences, be forced to recur to down-right atheism. The only middle opinion that can be invented, is that assertion of the Stoics that virtue is self-sufficient to its own happiness, and a full reward to itself in all cases, even under the greatest sufferings that can befal a man for its sake. Men who were not certain of a future state, (though most of them did indeed believe it highly probable,) and yet would not give up the cause of virtue, had no other way left to defend it than by asserting that it was in all cases, and under all circumstances, absolutely self-sufficient to its own happiness; whereas, on the contrary, because it is manifestly not self-sufficient, and yet undoubtedly the cause of virtue is not to be given up; therefore, they ought from thence to have concluded the certainty of a future state: That virtue is truly worthy to be chosen, even merely for its own sake, without any respect to any recompense or reward, must indeed necessarily be acknowledged; but it does not from hence follow, that he who dies for the sake of virtue is really any more happy than he that dies for any fond opinion, or any unreasonable humour or obstinacy whatsoever; if he has no other happiness than the bare satisfaction arising from the sense of his resoluteness in persisting to preserve his virtue, and in adhering immoveably to what he judges to be right, and there be no future state wherein he may reap any benefit of that his resolute perseverance. On the contrary, it will only follow, that God has made virtue necessarily amiable, and such as men's judgment and conscience can never but choose, and yet that he has not annexed to it any sufficient encouragement to support men effectually in that choice. Brave indeed, and admirable, were the things which some of the philosophers have said upon this subject, and which some very few extraordinary men (of which Regulus is a remarkable instance,) seem to have made good in their practice, even beyond the common abilities of human nature; but it is very plain, as I before intimated, that the general practice of virtue in the world can never be supported upon this foot; it being, indeed, neither possible nor truly reasonable that men, by adhering to virtue, should part with their lives, [231] if thereby they eternally deprived themselves of all possibility of receiving any advantage from that adherence. Virtue, it is true, in its proper seat, and with all its full effects and consequences unhindered, must be confessed to be the chief good, as being truly the enjoyment, as well as the imitation of God; but, [232] as the practice of it is circumstantiated in this present world, and in the present state of things, it is plain it is not itself the chief good, but only the means to it, as running in a race is not in itself the prize, but the way to obtain it.

5. From whence the certainty of a future state is again concluded. It is therefore absolutely impossible, that the whole view and intention, the original and the final design of God's creating such rational beings as men are, indued with such noble faculties, and so necessarily conscious of the eternal and unchangeable differences of good and evil; it is absolutely impossible (I say) that the whole design of an infinitely wise, and just, and good God, in all this, should be nothing more than to keep up eternally a succession of new generations of men, and those in such a corrupt, confused, and disorderly state of things as we see the present world is in, without any due and regular observation of the eternal rules of good and evil, without any clear and remarkable effect of the great and most necessary differences of things, without any sufficient discrimination of virtue and vice, by their proper and respective fruits, and without any final vindication of the honour and laws of God, in the proportionable reward of the best, or punishment of the worst of men: And consequently it is certain and necessary, (even as certain as the moral attributes of God before demonstrated,) that instead of continuing an eternal succession of new generations in the present form and state of things, there must at some time or other be such a revolution and renovation of things, such a future state of existence of the same persons, as that, by an exact distribution of rewards and punishments therein, all the present disorders and inequalities may be set right; and that the whole scheme of Providence, which to us who judge of it by only one small portion of it, seems now so inexplicable and much confused, may appear at its consummation to be a design worthy of infinite wisdom, justice, and goodness. Without this [233] all comes to nothing. If this scheme be once broken, there is no justice, no goodness, no order, no reason, nor any thing upon which any argument in moral matters can be founded, left in the world. Nay, even though we should set aside all consideration of the moral attributes of God, and consider only his natural perfections, his infinite knowledge and wisdom, as framer and builder of the world; it would even in that view only appear infinitely improbable that God should have created such beings as men are, and indued them with such excellent faculties, and placed them on this globe of earth, as the only inhabitants for whose sake this part at least of the creation is manifestly fitted up and accommodated; and all this without any further design [234] than only for the maintaining a perpetual succession of such short-lived generations of mortals as we at present are; to live in the utmost confusion and disorder for a very few years, and then perish eternally into nothing. [235] What can be imagined more vain and empty? What more absurd? What more void of all marks of wisdom, than the fabric of the world, and the creation of mankind, upon this supposition? But then, take in also the consideration of the moral attributes of God, and it amounts (as I have said) to a complete demonstration that there must be a future state.

6. Why the wisdom of God is not so clearly and plainly seen in his government of the moral, as in the fabric of the natural world. It may here at first sight seem to be a very strange thing, that through the whole system of nature in the material, in the inanimate, in the irrational part of the creation, every single thing should have in itself so many and so obvious, so evident and undeniable marks of the infinitely accurate skill and wisdom of their Almighty Creator, that, from the brightest star in the firmament of heaven to the meanest pebble upon the face of the earth, there is no one piece of matter which does not afford such instances of admirable artifice and exact proportion and contrivance, as exceeds all the wit of man (I do not say to imitate, but even) ever to be able fully to search out and comprehend; and yet, that in the management of the rational and moral world, for the sake of which all the rest was created, and is preserved only to be subservient to it, there should not in many ages be plain evidences enough, either of the wisdom, or of the justice and goodness of God, or of so much as the interposition of his divine providence at all, to convince mankind clearly and generally of the world's being under his immediate care, inspection, and government. This, I say, may indeed at first sight seem very wonderful. But if we consider the matter more closely and attentively, it will appear not to be so strange and astonishing as we are apt to imagine: For as, in a great machine, contriv ed by the skill of a consummate artificer, fitted up and adjusted with all conceivable accuracy for some very difficult and deep-projected design, and polished and fine wrought in every part of it with admirable niceness and dexterity, any man who saw and examined one or two wheels thereof could not fail to observe, in those single parts of it, the admirable art and exact skill of the workman; and yet the excellency of the end or use for which the whole was contrived he would not at all be able, even though he was himself a skilful artificer, to discover and comprehend, without seeing the whole fitted up and put together: So though in every part of the natural world, considered even single and unconnected, the wisdom of the great creator sufficiently appears, yet his wisdom, and justice, and goodness in the disposition and government of the moral world, which necessarily depends on the connexion and issue of the whole scheme, cannot perhaps be distinctly and fully comprehended by any finite and created beings, much less by frail and weak and short-lived mortals, before the period and accomplishment of certain great revolutions. But it is exceedingly reasonable to believe, that as the great discoveries, which by the diligence and sagacity of later ages have been made in astronomy and natural philosophy, have opened surprising scenes of the power and wisdom of the creator, beyond what men could possibly have conceived or imagined in former times; so at the unfolding of the whole scheme of providence in the conclusion of this present state, men will be surprised with the amazing manifestations of justice and goodness which will then appear to have run through the whole series of God's government of the moral world.

This is the chief and greatest argument on which the natural proof of a future state of rewards and punishments must principally be founded. Yet there are also several other collateral evidences which jointly conspire to render the same thing extremely credible to mere natural reason: As,

1st. Of the immortality of the soul and the natural proofs we have of it. There is very great reason, even from the bare nature of the thing itself, to believe the soul to be immortal, separate from all moral arguments drawn from the attributes of God, and without any consideration of the general system of the world, or of the universal order and constitution, connexion, and dependencies of things: The immortality of the soul has been commonly believed in all ages and in all places, [236] by the unlearned part of all civilized people, and by the almost general consent of all the most barbarous nations under heaven, from a tradition so ancient and so universal, as cannot be conceived to owe its original either to chance or to vain imagination, or to any other cause than to the author of nature himself: And the most learned and thinking part of mankind, at all times and in all countries, where the study of philosophy has been in any measure cultivated, have almost generally agreed, that it is capable of a just proof from the abstract consideration of the nature and operations of the soul itself: That none of the known qualities of matter can in any possible variation, division, or composition, produce sense, and thought, and reason, is abundantly evident, as has been demonstrated in the former discourse: [237] That matter consists of innumerable, divisible, separable, and for the most part actually disjoined parts, is acknowledged by all philosophers: That, since the powers and faculties of the soul are the most remote and distant from all the known properties of matter that can be imagined, it is at least a putting great violence upon our reason to imagine them superadded by omnipotence to one and the same substance, cannot easily be denied: That it is highly unreasonable and absurd to suppose the soul made up of innumerable consciousnesses, as matter is necessarily made up of innumerable parts; and, on the contrary, that it is highly reasonable to believe the seat of thought to be a simple substance, such as cannot naturally be divided and crumbled into pieces, as all matter is manifestly subject to be, must of necessity be confessed: Consequently the soul will not be liable to be dissolved at the dissolution of the body, and therefore it will naturally be immortal. All this seems to follow, at least with the highest degree of probability, from the single consideration of the soul's being indued with sense, thought, or consciousness. I cannot imagine, saith Cyrus, [238] (in that speech which Xenophon relates he made to his children a little before his death,) that the soul, while it is in this mortal body, lives, and that when it is separated from it, then it should die: I cannot persuade myself that the soul, by being separated from this body, which is devoid of sense, should thereupon become itself likewise devoid of sense: On the contrary, it seems to me more reasonable to believe that, when the mind is separated from the body, it should then become most of all sensible and intelligent; thus he: But then further; if we take also into the consideration all the higher and nobler faculties, capacities, and improvements of the soul, the argument will still become much stronger. I am persuaded, saith Cicero, [239] when I consider with what swiftness of thought the soul is indued, with what a wonderful memory of things past, and forecast of things to come; how many arts, how many sciences, how many wonderful inventions it has found out, that that nature, which is possessor of such faculties, cannot be mortal: Again; the memory, saith he, [240] which the soul has of things that have been, and its foresight of things that will be, and its large comprehension of things that at present are, are plainly divine powers; nor can the wit of man ever invent any way by which these faculties could possibly come to be in men, but by immediate communication from God: Again; though we see not, saith he, [241] the soul of man, as indeed neither are we able to see God; yet, as from the works of God we are certain of his being, so, from the faculties of the soul, its memory, its invention, its swiftness of thought, its noble exercise of all virtue, we cannot but be convinced of its divine original and nature: And, speaking of the strength and beauty of that argument, which, from the wonderful faculties and capacities of the soul, concludes it to be of an immaterial and immortal nature; though all the vulgar and little philosophers in the world, saith he, [242] (for so I cannot but call all such as dissent from Plato and Socrates, and those superior geniuses,) should put their heads together; they will not only never, while they live, be able to explain any thing so neatly and elegantly; but even this argument itself they will never have understanding enough fully to perceive and comprehend how neat, and beautiful, and strong it is. The chief prejudice against the belief of the soul's existing thus, and living after the death of the body, and the sum of all the objections brought against this doctrine by the Epicurean philosophers of old, who denied the immortality of the soul, and by certain atheistical persons of late, who differ very little from them in their manner of reasoning, is this: That they cannot apprehend how the soul can have any sense of perception, [243] without the body wherein evidently are all the organs of sense; But neither can they any better apprehend or explain how the soul in the body, [244] (that is, the body itself, according to their opinion,) is capable of sense or perception, by means of the organs of sense: And besides, this argument, that the soul can have no perception, when all the ways of perception that we have at present ideas of, are removed, is exactly the very same argument, and no other, than what a man born blind might make use of, with the very same force, to prove that none of us can possibly have in our present bodies any perception of light or colours, as I have explained more particularly in the former discourse. [245]

This consideration, The natural credibility of the soul's being immortal of great use to the wiser heathens. of the soul's appearing in all reason to be naturally immortal, afforded great pleasure and satisfaction to the wisest and soberest men in the heathen world; was a great support under calamities and sufferings, especially under such as men brought upon themselves by being virtuous; filled them with great hopes and comfortable expectations of what was to come hereafter, and was a mighty encouragement to the practice of all moral virtue, and particularly to take pains in subduing the body and keeping it in subjection to the reason of the mind. First, it afforded great pleasure and satisfaction to the wisest and soberest men in the heathen world, from the bare contemplation of the thing itself. Nobody, saith Cicero, [246] shall ever drive me from the hope of immortality; and, [247] if this my opinion concerning the immortality of the soul should at last prove an error, yet it is a very delightful error, and I will never suffer myself to be undeceived in so pleasing an opinion as long as I live. Secondly, it was a great support to them under calamities and sufferings, especially under such as men brought upon themselves by being virtuous: These and the like contemplations, saith Cicero, [248] had such an effect upon Socrates, that when he was tried for his life, he neither desired any advocate to plead his cause, nor made any supplication to his judges for mercy; and on the very last day of his life made many excellent discourses upon this subject, and a few days before, when he had an opportunity offered him to have escaped out of prison, he would not lay hold of it: For thus he believed, and thus he taught; that when the souls of men depart out of their bodies, they go two different ways; the virtuous to a place of happiness, the wicked and the sensual to misery. Thirdly, it filled them with great hopes and comfortable expectations of what was to come hereafter: O happy day, saith the good old man in Cicero, [249] when I shall go to that blessed assembly of spirits, and depart out of this wicked and miserably confused world! Lastly, it was a mighty encouragement to the practice of all moral virtue, and particularly to take pains in subduing the body and keeping it in subjection to the reason of the mind: We ought to spare no pains, saith Plato, [250] to obtain the habit of virtue and wisdom in this life; for the prize is noble, and the hope is very great. Again; having reckoned up the temporal advantages of virtue in the present world, he adds: [251] But we have not yet mentioned the greatest and chiefest rewards which are proposed to virtue; for what can be truly great in so small a portion of time? -- The whole age of the longest liver in this our present world, being inconsiderable, and nothing in comparison of eternity. And again; these things, saith he, [252] are nothing, either in number or greatness, in comparison with those rewards of virtue, and punishments of vice, which attend men after death. And to mention no more places, they, saith he, [253] who in the games hope to obtain a victory in such poor matters as wrestling, running, and the like, think not much to prepare themselves for the contest by great temperance and abstinence; and shall our scholars, in the study of virtue, not have courage and resolution enough to persevere, with patience, for a far nobler prize? Words very like those of St. Paul, 1 Cor. ix.24. Know ye not that they which run in a race, run all; and every man that striveth for the mastery, is temperate in all things? Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible.

2. The argument for a future state drawn from men's natural desire of immortality. Another argument which may be used in proof of a future state, so far as to amount to a very great probability, is, that necessary desire of immortality, which seems to be naturally implanted in all men, with an unavoidable concern for what is to come hereafter. If there be no existence after this life, it will seem that the irrational creatures who always enjoy the present good, without any care or solicitude for what may happen afterwards, are better provided for by nature than man, whose reason and foresight, and all other those very faculties, by which they are made more excellent than beasts, serve them, upon this supposition, scarcely for any other purpose, than to render them uneasy and uncertain, and fearful and solicitous about things which are not. And it is not at all probable that God should have given men appetites which were never to be satisfied; desires which had no objects to answer them; and unavoidable apprehensions of what was never really to come to pass.

3. Another drawn from men's conscience or judgment of-their own actions. Rom. ii.14, 15. Another argument, which may be brought to prove a future state, is that conscience which all men have of their own actions, or that inward judgment which they necessarily pass upon them in their own minds; whereby they that have not any law, are a law unto themselves, their conscience bearing witness, and their thoughts accusing or else excusing one another. There is no man, who at any time does good, and brave, and generous things, but the reason of his own mind applauds him for so doing; and no man at any time does things base and vile, dishonourable and wicked, but at the same time he condemns himself in what he does. The one is necessarily accompanied with good hope, and expectation of reward; the other with continual torment and fear of punishment. And hence, as before, it is not probable that God should have so framed and constituted the mind of man as necessarily to pass upon itself a judgment which shall never be verified, and stand perpetually and unavoidably convicted by a sentence which shall never be confirmed.

4. Another drawn from man's being by nature an accountable creature. Lastly, another argument, which may be drawn from right reason, in proof of a future state, is this; that man is plainly in his nature an accountable creature, and capable of being judged. Those creatures, indeed, whose actions are all determined by something without themselves, or by what we call mere instinct, as they are not capable of having a rule given them, so it is evident that neither can they be accountable for their actions. But man, who has entirely within himself a free principle or power of determining his own actions upon moral motives, and has a rule given him to act by, which is right reason, can be, nay, cannot but be, accountable for all his actions, how far they have been agreeable or disagreeable to that rule. Every man, because of the natural liberty of his will, can and ought to govern all his actions by some certain rule, and give a reason for every thing he does. Every moral action he performs, being free and without any compulsion or natural necessity, proceeds either from some good motive or some evil one; is either conformable to right reason, or contrary to it; is worthy either of praise or dispraise, and capable either of excuse or aggravation: Consequently, it is highly reasonable to be supposed, that since there is a Superior Being, from whom we received all our faculties and powers, and since in the right use or in the abuse of those faculties, in the governing them by the rule of right reason, or in the neglecting that rule, consists all the moral difference of our actions; there will at some time or other be an examination or inquiry made, into the grounds, and motives, and circumstances of our several actions, how agreeable or disagreeable they have been to the rule that was given us; and a suitable judgment be passed upon them. Upon these considerations the wisest of the ancient heathens believed and taught that the actions of every particular person should all be strictly tried and examined after his death, and he have accordingly a just and impartial sentence passed upon him: Which doctrine though the poets indeed wrapped up in fables and obscure riddles, yet the wisest of the philosophers had a better notion of it, and more agreeable to reason. From this judgment, saith Plato, [254] let no man hope to be able to escape: For though you could descend into the very depth of the earth, or fly on high to the extremities of the heavens; yet should you never escape the just judgment of the gods, either before or after death: An expression very agreeable to that of the Psalmist; Psal. cxxxix.8, 9.

These, I say, are very good and strong arguments for the great probability of a future state: But that drawn as above, from the consideration of the moral attributes of God, seems to amount even to a demonstration.